Planning Your Time

If you're settling into one town and making day trips, it's best to divide your time by visiting west and then east of Nice. Parallel roads along the corniches provide access into towns with different personalities, and the A8 main autoroute makes motoring from Monaco to St-Raphaël a breeze (just keep spare change handy, as there's a toll to use different parts of it—€3 between Cannes and Nice, for example). The coastal train is equally efficient. Tear yourself away from the coastal plages (beaches) at some point to visit the perched villages that this region is famed for. Reach them via Route Napoléon (N98), the D995, or the corniche roads, and plan on at least one overnight stop.